New Music Grammy Nominees 2016

Posted on December 8, 2015 by maestrobeats

We are thrilled that seven of our Albums of the Week received 2016 Grammy nominations! Here’s a recap of these awesome new music releases:

Seattle Symphony’s Dutilleux: Métaboles; L’Arbre Des Songes; Symphony No. 2, ‘Le Double’ (Best Orchestral Performance, Best Classical Instrumental Solo, & Engineered Album, Classical)

“The Seattle Symphony dances with precision and grace through the dense textures and intertwined solos of the first movement, the delicately colored timbres and haunting lyricism of the second, and finally the convulsive rhythms and fascinating orchestration of the third.” – Maggie Molloy (on Symphony No.2)

Roomful of Teeth’s Render (Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance)

“The last piece on the album is the title track, also composed by Brad Wells, which was inspired by David Eagleman’s short story ‘Search.’ The ensemble’s voices ebb and flow in soft waves, gracefully gliding in and out of near-silence to create a serene and mystical sound world.” – Maggie Molloy

eighth blackbird’s Filament (Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance)

“It goes without saying that the performance quality on this disc is top-notch, no less fine than any of eighth blackbird’s past albums. You’re luxuriously free to focus solely on the compositions themselves, all of which are worth contemplating at length. In an age when most albums’ connecting filaments are somewhere between ultrathin and nonexistent, it’s a pleasure to listen to a set of pieces with such close ties.” – Jill Kimball

Julia Wolfe’s Anthracite Fields (Best Contemporary Classical Composition)

“Anthracite Fields is not an easy listen, but I don’t think Julia Wolfe wanted it to be. We Americans tend to gloss over unpleasant parts of our history when, in order to make peace with our past, we’d do better to confront it. In telling these miners’ stories through vivid music, Wolfe has brought an important but often ignored chapter of our country’s story to the forefront…. You’ll learn a little about life in late-1800s Pennsylvania, you’ll contemplate energy usage and workers’ rights, and if you’re like me, you’ll have a good cry.” – Jill Kimball

Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s In the Light of Air (Producer of the Year, Classical – Dan Merceruio)

“As a composer, Thorvaldsdottir is known for creating large sonic structures that reveal a vast variety of sustained sound materials—and both of these pieces are a perfect example of her visionary style. Throughout the album, her subtle timbral nuances, poetic textures, and lyrical gestures immerse the listener in austere, somber, and utterly spellbinding soundscapes.” – Maggie Molloy

ZOFO’s ZOFO Plays Terry Riley (Producer of the Year, Classical – Dan Merceruio)

“‘ZOFO Plays Terry Riley’ proves that the musical magic of piano extends far beyond a pianist’s 10 fingers. Through their exploration of Riley’s works, Zimmermann and Nakagoshi paint a vivid and colorful picture of the immense textural, timbral, and stylistic possibilities of piano duets. After all, it’s amazing what a pianist can do with an extra hand or two.” – Maggie Molloy

Anythony de Mare’s Liaisons – Reimagining Sondheim from the Piano (Producer of the Year, Classical – Judith Sherman)

“Having just a vision’s no solution, everything depends on execution. Anthony de Mare’s work on this project has, bit by bit and piece by piece, amounted to a thoroughly enjoyable collection that sounds like thirty-six composers having a musical conversation with America’s preeminent composer of musical theatre. Liaisons offers up something familiar, something peculiar, something for everyone.” – Rachele Hales

ALBUM REVIEW: “Render” by Roomful of Teeth

Posted on April 27, 2015 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Molloy

Classical vocal music is always nice—but if you’re looking for a contemporary vocal ensemble with a little more bite, look no further than Roomful of Teeth.

The Grammy Award-winning a cappella ensemble is dedicated to exploring the vast and limitless musical possibilities of the human voice. In fact, Roomful of Teeth’s eight vocalists have studied singing traditions from around the world, including vocal techniques as diverse as yodeling, belting, Tuvan throat singing, Inuit throat singing, Korean P’ansori, Georgian singing, Sardinian cantu a tenore, Hindustani music, Persian classical singing, and more.

And now, you can hear the fruit of the group’s musical travels on their sophomore album, “Render.” The record is an eclectic collection of original compositions and commissioned works which push beyond the boundaries of traditional vocal music.

Founded in 2009, Roomful of Teeth is comprised of sopranos Estelí Gomez and Martha Cluver, altos Caroline Shaw and Virginia Warnken, tenor Eric Dudley, baritone Avery Griffin, bass baritone Dashon Burton, and bass Cameron Beauchamp. Together, the eight singers create a mesmerizing vocal panorama spanning over four octaves.

Their new album begins with a performance of Missy Mazzoli’s “Vesper Sparrow,” an enchanting and otherworldly piece which features the text of Farnoosh Fathi’s poem “Home State.” The sopranos soar sweetly above a percussive a cappella backdrop, creating a fascinating range of vocal timbres and musical characters.

“The piece is an eclectic amalgamation of imaginary birdsong and my own interpretation of Sardinian overtone singing,” Mazzoli said. “I tried to capture the exuberance and energy of these individual singers as well as a bit of the magic that is created when this group comes together.”

The piece is followed by Wally Gunn’s “The Ascendant,” a dramatic three-part composition which illuminates the haunting, poignant poetry of Maria Zajkowski. Glorious vocal harmonies glide above a hypnotic hocket backdrop, creating a slow but steady groove and an unbelievably rich chordal texture—Roomful of Teeth’s voices will echo in your head long after the piece is over.

William Brittelle’s “High Done No Why” is next on the album, showcasing the vocal virtuosity of each member of the ensemble by experimenting with a colorful palette of extended vocal techniques that reach far beyond the borders of the Western classical music tradition.

Caleb Burhans’ slow and somber “Beneath” is a similarly virtuosic feat: it is a 12-minute exploration into the ensemble’s unbelievably wide vocal range. Throughout the piece, the spellbinding blend of wordless vocals creates an utterly ethereal, borderline eerie soundscape.

The ensemble switches to the other end of the musical spectrum for “Otherwise,” composed by the group’s artistic director Brad Wells. The piece is vibrant, visceral, and full of color—it features singing, belting, yodeling, and even a few elements of Sardinian polyphonic folk singing. Baritone soloist Dashon Burton cuts through the rest of ensemble’s rhythmic chanting with a beaming bel canto voice, his classical singing contrasting beautifully against a striking harmonic backdrop.

Eric Dudley’s “Suonare / To Sound” explores a different element of vocal music: words. The piece is a meditation on timbre and language, featuring the same poem sung in both English and Italian—at the same time. The eight voices overlap and intersect as they echo across a constantly shifting soundscape, with the lower voices tracing the English text through slowly changing harmonies as the sopranos echo far above them.

The last piece on the album is the title track, also composed by Brad Wells, which was inspired by David Eagleman’s short story “Search.” The ensemble’s voices ebb and flow in soft waves, gracefully gliding in and out of near-silence to create a serene and mystical sound world.

“The story describes a vision of the afterlife as the periodic unraveling of our material, molecular selves into other forms in nature, occasional re-gatherings of our disparate molecules over millennia, and the complete continuity and maintenance—in spite of the unraveling—of our consciousness and feeling,” Wells said.

Of course, Roomful of Teeth says all of this without using any lyrics—proving that the possibilities of the human voice are far beyond words.

ALBUM REVIEW: Missy Mazzoli’s Vespers for a New Dark Age

Posted on March 30, 2015 by maestrobeats

by Jill Kimball
These days, there’s not much room for mystery. Thanks to technology, we can learn someone’s whole life story on the internet before a first date. We can walk the streets of far-flung cities without leaving the couch. There’s even a machine that connects with our brains and sketches out visual scenes from our dreams.

Composer Missy Mazzoli wonders whether there’s still room for the supernatural in our increasingly technological world, which she calls a “new dark age.” She explores that question in her latest album, Vespers for a New Dark Age.

In the last Dark Ages, we marveled in the mystery of a higher power and prayed in music-centered vesper services at church. Mazzoli’s album places the traditional vesper service in a 21st-century context, using contemporary poetry instead of liturgical readings, and mixing electronic music with human-powered sounds, including vocals by Roomful of Teeth, instrumentals by her orchestra Victoire, and percussion by Wilco drummer Glenn Kotche.

The resulting sound is wonderfully otherworldly, borrowing the best aspects of liturgical choral music, avant-garde electronica, and new age, and tying them all together. One of Missy Mazzoli’s greatest strengths as a composer is her ability to paint a unique, vivid musical picture, and she has certainly done that here.

Another of her strengths is finding original, incredibly thought-provoking text to set to music. Here, she has set excerpts of pointedly secular poems by Matthew Zapruder, which juxtapose oddly but beautifully with the rigid structure of a musical church service.

Zapruder clearly believes our gradual departure from the rituals and mysteries of religion is directly related to advancements in technology. He dismisses as archaic the idea that his thoughts and actions have cosmic consequences. Yet he still acknowledges that there’s some comfort in believing in the supernatural, especially in difficult times. (“Come on all you ghosts, / we need you, winter is not / through with us.” And, “I know you can hear me / I know you are here / I have heard you cough / and sigh.”)

Over the course of eight movements, the sounds of three ethereal vocalists combine with a few instrumental musicians and a bit of electronically-produced mixing to ask a question: what happens when spirituality meets technology? The answer is fuzzy, but some things are certain: In this age, we’re less inclined to accept mystery. But when life gets hard, or when we’re so mired in technology that we forget about human relationships (“I need things / no one can buy / and don’t even know / what they are”), we’d still like to believe there’s something out there that’s bigger than us.

That something doesn’t necessarily have to be a deity. It could just be a great piece of music…like this one.

ROOMFUL OF TEETH

Posted on May 19, 2014 by maestrobeats

by Maggie Stapleton

Founded in 2009 by Brad Wells, cutting-edge vocal ensemble Roomful of Teeth‘s stated mission is to “mine the expressive potential of the human voice,” and that they do. They’re extremely versatile, excelling in styles ranging from renaissance polyphony to vocal techniques from around the world, such as yodels, grunts, audible exhalations, and drones, all heard on their self-titled debut album (which, by the way, won the 2014 Grammy for “Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance”).

Roomful of Teeth is dedicated to new music and composers of today, they’ve commissioned works by Rinde Eckert, Judd Greenstein, Caleb Burhans, Merrill Garbus (of tUnE-yArDs), Sarah Kirkland Snider and Missy Mazzoli, and William Brittelle, who says his melodic sensibility tends more toward the pop side than classical or experimental side, resulting in some very fun music.

Roomful of Teeth was the first all vocal program presented by TownMusic in September 2013. We have some selections from this concert for your listening pleasure, including a couple of movements from Caroline Shaw’s 2013 Pulitzer Prize winning piece, Partita for 8 voices!

There’s one more concert on the 2013-14 TownMusic Series on June 24, featuring four world premieres and soprano Mary Mackenzie to sing Arnold Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire.